Op 29 juli 1981, terwijl de ogen van de wereld gericht zijn op Londen en iedereen in de ban is van het huwelijk van Prins Charles en Lady Diana Spencer, verdwijnt een achtjarige jongen op weg naar huis van de festiviteiten. Ondanks een grote zoekactie van de politie wordt hij nooit meer levend teruggevonden. Zeven maanden later worden zijn gedeeltelijke stoffelijke resten ontdekt in een klein stuk bos in het landelijke Sussex, vele kilometers van zijn huis vandaan. Veertig jaar later, en ondanks nieuw bewijsmateriaal, is er nog steeds niemand berecht voor de ontvoering en dood van Vishal Mehrotra, en lijkt de politie alle sporen te hebben uitgeput. Dan, op een dag, terwijl de wereld in lockdown gaat in 2020, ontvangt een lokale BBC-verslaggever een geheimzinnige boodschap van iemand die bij de politie heeft gewerkt – deze persoon vertelt hem dat ze iets buitengewoons hebben gezien dat de zaak volledig zou kunnen openbreken.
On 29th July 1981, while the eyes of the world are on London and captivated by the wedding of Prince Charles and Lady Diana Spencer, an eight-year-old boy disappears on his way home from the celebrations. Despite a huge police search he is never seen alive again. Seven months later his partial remains are discovered in a small patch of woodland in rural Sussex, many miles from home. Forty years on, and despite the emergence of new evidence, no-one has been brought to justice for the abduction and death of Vishal Mehrotra and the police appear to have exhausted all their leads. Then one day, as the world is going into lockdown in 2020, a BBC local reporter receives a secretive message from a person who has worked within the police – they tell him they’ve seen something extraordinary that could blow the case wide open.
That call sets in motion an epic true story – an astonishing podcast investigation, three years in the making, that has consequences no-one could have imagined. As the team investigate they track down and question a convicted paedophile, a teacher who fled the UK while being questioned by police in relation to child sexual abuse in the 1990s and has been on the run across the world for over 25 years. Most shocking of all, the series discovers that a UK police force had been aware for years he’d been at the address and had decided not to try to bring him back – while telling Vishal’s family that he hadn’t been located.
The disappearance of Vishal Mehrotra is a case that haunts our age: a case that has repeatedly fallen through the cracks over 40 years – the cracks of our justice system, of our collective attention, of who we choose to listen to and who we don’t. In this extraordinary podcast series, Vishal’s 30 year old half-brother Suchin Mehrotra and investigative reporter Colin Campbell set out to gather the pieces and try to get answers. What they uncover takes them deep into the disturbing underworld of what appears to be a completely separate crime – and sends them halfway across the globe in a search for the truth. Alongside a deeply moving personal story about the toll of this tragedy on one family across generations, what also emerges is a picture of all of us and the world we live in now.
After the series launches Colin is approached by people who say they have information – things noticed decades before and never forgotten. But 40 years on can these memories push the investigation forward?
If you have been affected by child sexual abuse, help and support is available at bbc.co.uk/actionline
